How to write memoir with Marion Roach Smith, author and teacher
WHEN IT COMES TO the work of planning a memoir, the advice you will receive online, in books and in person should always include the words “structure” and “argument,” as well as the question, “What is this about?” If you’ve taken any of my online … [Continue reading]
LATER THIS WEEK, I’ll be teaching a free class called “How to Start an Excellent Memoir.” I last offered this class in August, and it was very well received. So, we’re doing it again. … [Continue reading]
SINCE PUBLICATION OF THE MEMOIR PROJECT, my irreverent little book on how to write memoir, there has not been one day that I have not wanted to tweak it, adding a small thought or a phrase to what I published in its pages. And why not? Every day I … [Continue reading]
IS THIS YOU IN THE PHOTO? Is this what you do during the time you set aside to work on your memoir? Are you stuck in your writing? Do you get up out of the chair and walk around, get distracted and generally feel like you have no more to say? Does … [Continue reading]
How true does memoir have to be? It’s a fine question and one I get a lot as a memoir coach and writing teacher. And it’s one I’ve asked myself many times, of course, particularly when wrestling with differing versions of my own tale. How true does … [Continue reading]
ACCENTUATE THE COMPLICATED. Yes, I know, the phrase does not have the syncopation of the wildly more popular (as well as musical), “Ac-cen-tu-ate the positive,” but as far as I can tell, the complicated makes better memoir. But along the … [Continue reading]
IT ARRIVES FOUR TIMES EACH YEAR. You think I mean the seasons changing, don't you? Nope. Not that. Or, more to the point, all that plus this one other altogether totemic quarterly moment that happens in each of those seasonal shifts. You know what … [Continue reading]